Learning Chess through Jiujitsu

Intelligence might be the same thing as pattern recognition. For some reason, modern intellectuals are obsessed with intrinsic ability to recognize patterns (IQ). They are focused on brain hardware. But a far more important and interesting aspect of pattern recognition is simple exposure to new patterns and concepts. Our brains have the ability to learn new information and store patterns away for future use—adding new tools to our conceptual toolbox.

Better to have an average IQ with a wide exposure to different ideas, concepts, and principles, than a high-IQ with narrow exposure. Specialization can literally make people stupid, even about the subject they are specialized in—sometimes especially stupid about the subject they are specialized in.

Here’s an example from my own life. Learning the basics of Brazilian Jiujitsu exposed me to a bunch of new concepts, and one of them made an immediate impact on my chess ability. Despite playing chess for a decade before taking up BJJ, I completely missed an obvious and important principle.

Within the first week of training BJJ, I was verbally introduced to the concept of energy management. In the philosophy of the Gracies (the founders of BJJ), a smaller opponent can dramatically improve his chances of self-defense by draining his opponent’s energy. It’s difficult to choke somebody unconscious or break their limbs if they are strong and full of energy. But no matter how strong somebody is, once their body is physically exhausted and filled with lactic acid, they are easy to defeat. It doesn’t matter if there’s a hundred pound difference between them—once their battery is drained, they automatically lose.

So the strategic principle of energy management is of paramount importance. I appreciated this idea immediately, but then I experienced it over and over, getting my ass kicked while completely exhausted. The principle is real. Despite training both Karate and Japanese Jujutsu for years before, I never really grasped the importance of this concept. 

After the thrill of discovering this new concept, I wondered: where else does this happen? Initially, the thought popped in my head, “Well, energy management isn’t a part of chess, because the game is mental, not physical.” Then I quickly realized how stupid that idea was. Of course energy management is a part of chess—just like the body gets tired, so does the mind. The brain itself gets fatigued. Chess is physically and mentally exhausting at a high level.

And it turns out, the best chess player in the world uses this strategy all the time. Magnus Carlson is known for dragging his opponents into deep, tiresome endgames, where he wins a war of attrition. Against the best players in the world, he will enter theoretically drawn endgames and end up winning, because his opponent needs to make forty precise moves in a grueling endgame. One small slip-up, and the position will be lost—exactly like the Gracie masters would do while fighting. It’s the same principle.

I now have this tool in my conceptual toolbox. If I only studied chess, I don’t know how long it would have taken me to grasp this idea deeply. Now I see the same pattern everywhere. That is an increase in intelligence, even if my IQ didn’t budge a point.